(1905–1990)
Kathleen
Fitzpatrick exerted a powerful influence on several generations of History
students, an inspired and inspiring teacher.
When appointed Associate Professor in 1948, she was only the third
woman in the University to have achieved this rank. Her assessment of
her contribution is typically self-effacing: “I did some research, wrote
some books and articles and served on committees, but I chiefly justified
my place by making myself useful in lecturing and administration.”
The citation for her LLD honoris causa in 1983 puts a different complexion
on this. Her lectures ‘were an unfailing compound of lucidity, scholarship,
wit and elegance and it would be interesting to calculate the number
of now senior academics who were seduced by them into the pursuit of
History’.
Teaching took time which might otherwise have resulted in publications,
but two books were influential. "Australian Explorers", published
in 1953 by Oxford University Press, introduced the explorers to an Australian
and overseas readership. "Solid Bluestone Foundations and Other
Memories of a Melbourne Girlhood, 1908–1928", published in 1983,
joined with her chapter in "The Half-Open Door", provide a
beautifully-crafted insight into one of Melbourne’s best-loved teachers.
A foundation member of the Australian Humanities Research Council and
Foundation Fellow of the Australian Academy of the Humanities, Kathleen
Fitzpatrick was the first woman appointed to the Council of the National
Library of Australia. She is honoured by an annual lecture which bears
her name.
With the generosity of spirit for which she was renowned, her bequest
to the University Library of funds for books for History, bears the
name of her father, Henry Arthur Pitt, in gratitude for allowing her
the university education of which he had been deprived.
